Maybe with an batch.cmd:C:\>UNPACK *.zip INTO STEP1CD STEP1C:\STEP1>UNPACK *.zip INTO STEP2CD STEP2C:\STEP1\STEP2>UNRAR *.rar INTO STEP3CD STEP3C:\STEP1\STEP2\STEP3>EXTRAXT *.exe INTO STEP4... to be continue

REM //Extract the passed file, to current directoryREM //overwriting files.winRAR x -o+ %1REM //Should have a graceful error case here to make sure the operation completedREM //successfully, if not then exit script... how to do this?

Hmm.. Total Commander handles that for me. Since it "opens" archives as directories/folders, all you have to do is keep pressing enter/clicking on it till you get to the actual file. Then you can drag/copy it out to the desktop (or wherever) or to the other windowpane. So far I have tested with multi-level combinations of zips and rars nest in each other, 6 archive deep.

Hmm.. Total Commander handles that for me. Since it "opens" archives as directories/folders, all you have to do is keep pressing enter/clicking on it till you get to the actual file. Then you can drag/copy it out to the desktop (or wherever) or to the other windowpane. So far I have tested with multi-level combinations of zips and rars nest in each other, 6 archive deep.

That's ok. Even winrar can do that. with only 1 archive embeded (no matter how many levels) it is ok to do this, but what about when you have 5 archives in 1 archive, and then in those 5 archives you have 1 archive each, but that 1 archive is a split archive... so to extract the files, you need to get all those 5 archives hidden within each of those split archives and then extract them.. sigh, i guess i am not making much sense, let me see if i can whip up a sample for you...

How often do you actually encounter stuff like this? I've no doubt its very annoying but it must be very rare, and isn't it illogical as solid archiving would achieve better compression than this sort of nested archiving.

How often do you actually encounter stuff like this? I've no doubt its very annoying but it must be very rare, and isn't it illogical as solid archiving would achieve better compression than this sort of nested archiving.

That said though I don't know of any program to help you, sorry.

No problem! Thanks anyway.I was just trying to plumb the intellect of the donationcoder community to figure out if there was a better way to do this other than what I've found so far. (which i am sure there is)Obsessed with making things easy & simple, and a programmer, i figured there oughta be a way. As for frequency, you are right it isn't that often, maybe once or twice a week. No doubt the logic is unfathomable, regardless that is what one recieves and one has to try and improve where one can.

Anyway thinking of all this has made me think that maybe i ought to write the psuedocode and maybe that will help explain what i need.

Examine passed file/directoryProcess each file if not archive, skip //base case, exit condition elseif archive extract all files with path into a subdir $temp$, overwriting existing files set flag $extracted$if flag $extracted$ call self with $temp$ //recursive call delete archive(s) in $temp$ //remove temp archives as they should be extracted by now

// there should probably be some ending code to move extracted files from $temp$ to directory of the orginal archive

I forget if this is an in-order, pre-order, or post-order traversal recursive algorithm http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tree_search. But i think that should do the trick. Though, the important thing is to extract all level 1s first, then process the next level, as only then will split archives be handled appropriately.

That's ok. Even winrar can do that. with only 1 archive embeded (no matter how many levels) it is ok to do this, but what about when you have 5 archives in 1 archive, and then in those 5 archives you have 1 archive each, but that 1 archive is a split archive... so to extract the files, you need to get all those 5 archives hidden within each of those split archives and then extract them.. sigh, i guess i am not making much sense, let me see if i can whip up a sample for you...

Would you be able to upload a sample archive (filled with dummy text archives) with the above mentioned structure with it?

That's ok. Even winrar can do that. with only 1 archive embeded (no matter how many levels) it is ok to do this, but what about when you have 5 archives in 1 archive, and then in those 5 archives you have 1 archive each, but that 1 archive is a split archive... so to extract the files, you need to get all those 5 archives hidden within each of those split archives and then extract them.. sigh, i guess i am not making much sense, let me see if i can whip up a sample for you...

Would you be able to upload a sample archive (filled with dummy text archives) with the above mentioned structure with it?

I wrote a AHK script for myself once + integrated it in 2xplorer. So I just click a button and all archives in the folder get unpacked. Perhaps it's of use for you? It unpacks all archives in a folder in a subfolder (archive-name).

Installation: paste code in notepad, edit the second line pointing to winrar.exe, save as whatever.ahk, install authotkey (autohotkey.com)

Usage: Copy sourcefolder in clipboard and launch the script, or pass the sourcefolder as first parameter. An optional second parameter would be a targetfolder (where to place unpacked files).

Limitation: Some (rare) RAR names makes it to mess up. Didn't figure that out yet.